Quote Originally Posted by dimviii View Post
While Mikkelsen did a good job,he advantaged from road position.See Bonato who is faster from Kopecky Tidemand at the 2 long stages
With conditions like that it's an advantage in one corner and disadvantage in another, don't think there is a clean pick in front. However he did have different tires and 1 less spare than most.

After 19 cars (Kopecky) and 31 (Bonato) the road is for sure muddy, if it's drying out it can be drier mud and dry tarmac in clean spots.
First 3 cars on the road can have wet clean road and 12 on road (Mikkelsen) could have drier muddy road + dry(er) tarmac sections.

Anyway the point really wasn't that Mikkelsen is driving so much faster than everyone, but that he seemingly handled the C3 well in tricky conditions which were supposed to be the worst option. That is the surprising part.